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Saturday, May 19, 2012

TED Talks Editors Reject Nick Hanauer's Talk on Income Inequality

This controversy has been all over Facebook (and I am sure other sites as well) as the video too hot for TED to post. The National Journal (not to be confused with the right-wing National Review) has provided a pretty good overview of the controversy.

Over the years I have learned that people love to get bent our of shape about material that is not posted - as if somehow the mere fact of it being withheld makes it important. TED does not post all of he videos they record, even at their flagship events, so I assumed this was not worth paying attention to.

However, it turns out that the topic is one I care a lot about and feel is something we MUST address if we hope to solve some of the problems in this country - income inequality. There is a reason Marx's ideas have been receiving a lot more attention in the last few years - the disparity of wealth in this country is staggering.

Here is the bulk of the article, with links to relevant materials. It appears that part of their reasons for not posting this is that Hanauer makes partisan political statements and TED has tried to be non-partisan, which has been an on-going struggle with the locally produced TEDx talks. Take that for what it's worth.

There’s one idea . . . that TED’s organizers recently decided was
too controversial to spread: the notion that widening income inequality
is a bad thing for America, and that as a result, the rich should pay
more in taxes.

TED
organizers invited a multimillionaire Seattle venture capitalist named
Nick Hanauer – the first nonfamily investor in Amazon.com – to give a
speech on March 1 at their TED University conference. Inequality was the
topic – specifically, Hanauer’s contention that the middle class, and
not wealthy innovators like himself, are America’s true “job creators.”

“We’ve
had it backward for the last 30 years,” he said. “Rich businesspeople
like me don’t create jobs. Rather they are a consequence of an
ecosystemic feedback loop animated by middle-class consumers, and when
they thrive, businesses grow and hire, and owners profit. That’s why
taxing the rich to pay for investments that benefit all is a great deal
for both the middle class and the rich.”

You can’t
find that speech online. TED officials told Hanauer initially they were
eager to distribute it. “I want to put this talk out into the world!”
one of them wrote him in an e-mail in late April. But early this month
they changed course, telling Hanauer that his remarks were too
“political” and too controversial for posting.

Other TED talks posted online veer sharply into controversial and political territory, including NASA scientist James Hansen comparing climate change to an asteroid barreling toward Earth, and philanthropist Melinda Gates pushing for more access to contraception in the developing world.

TED
curator Chris Anderson referenced the Gates talk in an e-mail to
colleagues in early April, which was also sent to Hanauer, suggesting
that he didn't want to release Hanauer’s talk at the same time as the
one on contraception.

Hanauer’s talk “probably ranks as one of the
most politically controversial talks we've ever run, and we need to be
really careful when” to post it, Anderson wrote on April 6. “Next week
ain't right. Confidentially, we already have Melinda Gates on
contraception going out. Sorry for the mixed messages on this.”

In early May Anderson followed up with Hanauer to inform him he’d decided not to post his talk.

National Journal
e-mailed Anderson to request an interview about what made a talk on
inequality more politically controversial than, for example,
contraception or climate change. Anderson, who is traveling abroad,
responded with an e-mail statement that appeared to swipe at the
popularity of Hanauer’s speech.

"Many of the talks given at the conference or at TED-U are not released,” Anderson wrote. “We only release one a day on TED.com and
there's a backlog of amazing talks from all over the world. We do not
comment publicly on reasons to release or not release [a] talk. It's
unfair on the speakers concerned. But we have a general policy to avoid
talks that are overtly partisan, and to avoid talks that have received
mediocre audience ratings."

You can read the full story of Hanauer and his warnings about the decline of the middle class on Thursday as part of National Journal’s Restoration Calls series.

Update: 4:09 p.m.

In a May 7 email to Hanauer,
forwarded to NJ, Anderson took issue with several of Hanauer's
assertions in the talk, including the idea that businesspeople aren't
job creators. He also made clear his aversion to the "political" nature
of the talk.

"I agree with your language about ecosystems, and
your dismissal of some of the mechanistic economy orthodoxy, yet many of
your own statements seem to go further than those arguments justify,"
Anderson wrote.

"But even if the talk was rated a home run, we
couldn't release it, because it would be unquestionably regarded as out
and out political. We're in the middle of an election year in the US.
Your argument comes down firmly on the side of one party. And you even
reference that at the start of the talk. TED is nonpartisan and is
fighting a constant battle with TEDx organizers to respect that
principle....

"Nick, I personally share your disgust at the growth
in inequality in the US, and would love to have found a way to give
people a clearer mindset on the issue, without stoking a tedious
partisan rehash of all the arguments we hear every day in the mainstream
media.

"Alas, my judgment - and it is just a judgment, and
that's why my job title is 'curator' - is that publishing your talk
would not meet that goal."